


I See Red

by RavennaWritesFanfiction



Series: From Songs [3]
Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: Anger, Cheating, F/M, Falling Out of Favor, Gangsters, Gen, Revenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-04
Updated: 2020-10-13
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:02:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26824846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RavennaWritesFanfiction/pseuds/RavennaWritesFanfiction
Summary: Michael Gray thinks because he is a Peaky Blinder, he can have anyone he wants. His girlfriend (Reader) disagrees and takes his cheating far more personal than he could have thought...This is a song!fic based on I See Red by Everybody Loves An Outlaw
Relationships: Michael Gray/Reader
Series: From Songs [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1250909
Comments: 6
Kudos: 21





	1. Chapter 1

_**Did you really think, I'd just forgive and forget, no** _

Sitting across from the man you had once loved; now you wanted nothing more than to pull the trigger to the gun clutched tightly in your fist. You had been biding your time for ages now, letting the anger steep and boil over. There had been hours upon hours spent thinking of nothing else than his downfall. He had thought you’d get over it and you’d be fine. Afterall, he was Michael Gray, a senior member of Shelby Company Limited and a Peaky Blinder; any woman would be lucky to have him.

_**After catching you with her** _

_**Your blood should run cold, so cold** _

_**You, you two-timing, cheap-lying, wannabe** _

Polly had begged you, or at least as much as Polly would beg, not to hurt Michael. You were like a daughter to her, but he was still her son and she would come for you if you hurt him. That was fair, though some son he had been to her. He had done nothing but put her through hell since coming back. Everything he touched withered and died. He wanted to be just like Tommy, but he was worse than Tommy would ever be. 

Tommy was strategic. Michael was conniving. You had thought he could have ruled the world until he betrayed you too. You still wondered why you were surprised to walk in on them, a tangle of flesh and fine linen. You had seen her at the parties for months now, always eyeing Michael when the two of you paraded by. Too bad you hadn’t seen the look in his eyes when he caught hers. 

You weren’t even going to go upstairs that night. Michael wasn’t supposed to be home and you were busy finishing up business proposals for Tommy. Of course, a Peaky Blinder would investigate a loud crashing thud coming from the assumed vacant upstairs. How he had managed to sneak her in was beyond you. Words weren’t. Neither were actions as you snatched her up by the hair, still naked, and dragged her down the stairs and out the door. You weren’t just around for the legitimate business. You were glad to get your hands dirty. He should have known.

_**You're a fool, if you thought that I'd just let this go** _

_**I see red, red, oh red** _

_**A gun to your head, head, to your head** _

_**Now all I see is red, red, red** _

The naked girl feared for Michael and ran straight to the betting shop. Tommy and Polly, concerned for Michael, rushed to your shared home and up the stairs where they heard screaming and shouting. Your gun aimed directly at Micheal as tears raced faster than Tommy’s horses down your cheeks. 

Polly saw immediately that the gun was cocked and pulled Tommy back. Tommy came up behind you pulling your arm down away from his cousin, you pulled the trigger in the process, destroying the mirror to the left of your intended target. You screamed at Tommy as he pulled you to the ground, still wrapped in his arms. You thrashed to be let go, you wanted Michael’s heart to break like yours.

Polly reached for Michael to pull him from the room so that Tommy could calm you down, but he wouldn’t move from his spot. His mind ran in circles trying to pinpoint when everything had gone to shit. When he had failed so horribly to be a good person. He hadn’t always been so bad. Now he was the worst one in the lot, for breaking your heart. The one you had entrusted to him and him alone. 

_**Did you really just say, she didn't mean anything, oh** _

_**I'll remember those words, when I come for your soul, your soul** _

_**Know that you, you dug your own grave, now lie in it** _

_**You're so cruel, but revenge is a dish best served cold** _

“(Y/N), Please. I didn’t mean it. She isn’t important. Please, I’m sorry, Love.” Micheal tried to reach for you but Tommy’s icy glare reached him before he reached you. 

Hearing that he had broken your heart for a girl that didn’t mean anything relit the fire in your soul. You would remember those words for the rest of his life. There would be no second chances, no happily ever afters for you two. Just a bullet with his name on it. 

_**I see red, red, oh red** _

_**A gun to your head, head, to your head, oh** _

_**Executioner style, and there won't be no trial** _

_**Don't you know that you're better off dead** _

_**All I see is red, red, oh red** _

_**Now all I see is** _

That had been years ago now and Michael had fallen out of favor. He had betrayed his family for the last time. Polly didn’t have his back anymore. He was fair game. Michael had made himself scarce, hiding away from the family that wanted him dead. He knew that one day they would find him. Tommy or Arthur would be sitting where you sat currently, waiting for him to finish his one last drink before his world faded to black as you dropped the curtain on his life.

He hadn’t thought it would be you. The girl who had smiled at him with wide eyes. Not the woman who fiercely protected him like armor. But it wasn’t that woman sat there he realized. It was the woman who sees red, tears racing down with a gun cocked. You weren’t shedding tears for him now. 

_**Run, hide** _

_**Oh, you're so done** _

_**Oh, better sleep with one eye open tonight** _

He finished his drink and leaned back in his chair, all fight leaving his body. How could he run when death looked so beautiful. Far more precious and beautiful to him than the naked girl ever could have dreamed of being. She was so fragile, so refined. Desperate for perfection and doing anything to grasp it. Perhaps her perfection is why he had failed you. 

You were vengeance with wings. Violent and untamed. Wings tattered from the abuse. You were cracked marble. Your beauty wasn’t perfection, but determination. Clawing through the mud grasping survival. 

You watched him as his eyes glazed over in thought. It wasn’t fun hunting someone who was resigned to death. It didn’t feel like the revenge you had been hunting. You holstered your gun and stood. 

“I’m not going to kill you. But I will tell the others where they could find you if they are so inclined,” shaking your head at the pitiful state he and his refuge were in, “Oh, how the mighty fall.” With that you leave the shack you found him in. Turning your back forever on Michael Gray.


	2. What To Do About Michael

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (Y/N) reports back about where Michael is living and the others decide his fate. She thinks back and realizes that they are all making mistakes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to the Guest who requested the part two. I was truly stumped about where to take it since I hadn't planned on a second part. I hope you enjoy this as much as the first part. It isn't based on a song or anything, but is more based on the reader and the Shelbys. ENJOY <3

(Y/N) walked into the cold air. It hadn’t seemed this cold when she had walked into the shack that Michael was living in, but then again, maybe because her anger had been enough to keep her warm. She still hated Michael, but now she pitied him more. She would keep good on her word and tell the boys where the little rat was hiding, but that would be the end of it. Michael Gray would no longer consume her life.

Polly had surprised her when she didn’t argue or try and stop her from killing him. Maybe Polly hoped that (Y/N)’s love for Michael was enough to grant him a swift death. She didn’t have any such hope in regards to how the boys might handle it should they be given the opportunity. Michael had made his bed, and as his mother, she would have to let him lie in it. She had bailed him out far too many times and it had gotten them nowhere. This had to be the end of it.

Of course the sorrow hit her when (Y/N) walked into the offices after leaving in a hurry, gun in hand. She knew what was about to transpire in a way only a mother could. (Y/N) was shaking, but not in the just-killed-a-man way, but in a spiraling out of control way. She hadn’t done it. 

“Pol, gather the boys won’t you. We need a family meeting,” she shivered as she removed her coat and pulled her peaked cap from her head, fixing her hair and heading to the room for the meeting. 

It was one of those odd days where everyone was in the office at the same time. One of those rare days where it didn’t take a while to herd them up. They were typically like cats, hard to get in one place. 

Tommy entered first and sat at the head of the table. Polly sat to his left and Arthur sat to his right. Finn took a place beside Arthur and (Y/N) leaned on the wall behind Polly. She didn’t want to sit and by all means she didn’t have a spot at the table anyway. They never would have stopped her from sitting, but in this instance, she didn’t want to sit.

“Alright,(Y/N). What was so important that you had to call a meeting for?” Tommy lit his cigarette and looked her in the eye. She shivered and lit one of her own before getting to the point.

“Found Michael,” she watched for the flinch that Polly would surely try to suppress. “He’s been living in a shack on the other side of town. Looks bloody terrible.”

“Is that your way of telling us that he is no longer our concern or a threat?” Tommy raised and eyebrow and Polly balled her hands into fists. 

“No, Tommy. She said he looks terrible. Not looked. She didn’t do it.” Arthur was perceptive when he wanted to be, she’d give him that.

“Arthur is right. He was pathetic and not worth the bullet. But I told him I would tell you all where he was. It’s up to you what happens to him now.” Polly shuddered, Finn’s mouth hung open and Arthur shook his head. Tommy put out the cigarette and stood from his seat.

“So what to do about the rat. Arthur, ideas?” Tommy Shelby, taking suggestions. What a time to be alive. She stood quietly against the wall in anticipation. 

“Cut him a smile and drop him in the Cut?” Always a fan of the classics. It would clearly show that you don’t fuck with the Peaky Blinders and it didn’t lack in the overall brutality that eventually awaited them all.

“Arthur, not a terrible plan, but does anyone have any other suggestions?” Tommy was pacing at the head of the table, clearly trying to come up with an appropriate means to dispose of the boy who had wanted to be just like him.

“Well, he cheated on (Y/N), so maybe do like the Italians and cut him and let’em bleed?” Finn was feeding off the frenzy stirring through the room. Polly smacked him one for suggesting it and Tommy grunted a response.

“Finn Boy, we aren’t the Italians. We aren’t doing that.” Polly relaxed a bit and (Y/N) started thinking back to the beginning of everything. 

They had been the back alley razor gang with only Birmingham to roam. It had been about the family. Always family. Having the life they hadn’t always had. Getting the thing they wanted most in life. 

Tommy had given Michael a position in the company because he was Polly’s son, his cousin. Had he been a stranger, it never would have happened, but he was blood. And Michael had been the innocent of them all, but it had all gone to his head, much like it had Tommy. He wanted to be Tommy and he flew too close to the sun. 

She might hate him for what he became and what he did, but the warm lazy mornings in bed, the nights cuddled up in blankets next to the fire, the bantering in the kitchen, all of it still played through her mind. His smile, the way Polly looked at them; she could never forgive him for bedding another woman in their bed, but he didn’t necessarily deserve what was being passed back in forth in this room. She realized that she shouldn’t have told them where he was. What he was doing to himself was way worse than what anyone in this room could do to him. Death was a mercy he didn’t deserve, but torture was a cruelty that hadn’t been earned. 

“Stop! All of you,” (Y/N) put her cigarette out and spoke for the first time since this conversation started, “I think we have all forgotten why we are sat at this table here and now.” 

“Love, we clearly haven’t. We are here cause you couldn’t kill Michael.” Arthur clearly didn’t see.

“No, Arthur. That is not at all why we are here. Family. That’s why Shelby Company Ltd. was formed. To give the Shelbys, and the Grays, the life that they always wanted.” She looked at Tommy. “Did he betray me? Absolutely and I will not forgive it. Did he betray the family? Maybe although I doubt it was entirely intentional. He was suggestable and jaded. He wanted to be like the great Thomas Shelby, King of Whatever he Wants.” looking around, she could see looks of confusion. 

“I don’t get it. Are you suggesting we let him go?” Finn was perplexed, sure, but he got the general theme.

“Yes. What he is currently doing to himself is far worse than anything you have suggested, but he’s family. You don’t have to like or trust him, but may I suggest not killing him?” 

“What happened to “as we see fit?” Arthur was irritated.

“Do you really think Polly wants to sit and listen to all the ways you all want to kill her son, your cousin? Beat the shit out of him if you must, but he doesn’t deserve death.” (Y/N) leaned back against the wall. She had said her peace.

“(Y/N) and I will have a meeting with Michael. If I believe what he has to say, he can live and we will relocate him to a less shitty place to live, if not, it’s the Cut for him.” With that Tommy turned and left the room, Arthur shook his head and went back to his office. Finn looked disappointed and went to meet Isaiah at the Garrison. 

“Why’d you do it, Dear?” Polly didn’t look at her, but she wasn’t angry at the turn of events.

“They didn’t need Michael’s blood on their hands and despite everything, some of my happiest moments were with Michael.” With that, (Y/N) left Polly alone in the room and stepped back out in the Autumn air. She didn’t bother with her coat or her gun. She wasn’t going far anyway. 

She unlocked the door to the house she had lived in with Michael. It hadn’t changed much. It was small and covered in dust. If Tommy believed him later, she might suggest moving him in here. It was close and they could keep their eyes on him. She called Lizzie and ordered a maid to clean it up. 

Just in case.


End file.
